


Trying to Land

by Theoroark



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, Mental Health Issues, Team Talon (Overwatch)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-13
Updated: 2019-06-13
Packaged: 2020-05-07 04:56:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,108
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19202323
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Theoroark/pseuds/Theoroark
Summary: Sombra’s away on assignment, so Widow can’t rely on her favorite distraction. She tries to sleep. When that fails, she tries to watch some terrible reality show that Akande likes. But none of it helps. The thought’s turned into an itch, and the restlessness is suffocating. She feels like she could run for miles, but she’s too tired to leave her quarters.So she takes the kitchen scissors into the bathroom and stands in front of the mirror.-Widowmaker cuts her hair.





	Trying to Land

Widowmaker doesn’t remember much about the process of her conditioning, she imagines by design. But she’s seen pictures of herself from right before then, and Sombra’s got pictures of her right after. Her hair was shorter then, mid-neck length, almost black before and her current navy after. Sombra’s not sure why her hair deoxygenated before her skin did. She hypothesizes it’s because Talon wanted to let Widow blend in normal society for a while, before they realized the dangers of that. Widow doesn’t really care.

 

Akande’s the one who gives her the idea. They spar every morning– part of her effort to get better at close combat, so that Oxton girl can’t be quite so obnoxious. Maybe her ponytail whipped around as dodged and blocked, or maybe Akande simply noticed it would be an easy grapple in a fight. In any case, when they’re sitting on the floor of the boxing ring, panting and rehydrating, Akande mentions, “You know, you can cut your hair.”

 

Widow freezes, the nozzle of her water bottle just off her mouth. “What?”

 

“You don’t have to, of course,” Akande says. “But I wanted to make sure you knew you could. Just in case Moira said some nonsense.”

 

“Oh,” Widow says. “No. She didn’t.” Akande nods, satisfied. “It just never occured to me, I suppose.”

 

Akande eyes her back, says “Well. Just wanted to make sure you knew,” and drops it.

 

But the thought sticks with Widow all day. Sombra’s away on assignment, so Widow can’t rely on her favorite distraction. She tries to sleep. When that fails, she tries to watch some terrible reality show that Akande likes. But none of it helps. The thought’s turned into an itch, and the restlessness is suffocating. She feels like she could run for miles, but she’s too tired to leave her quarters.

 

So she takes the kitchen scissors into the bathroom and stands in front of the mirror. She gathers her hair in a loose ponytail at the base of her skull. She can’t remember the last time she had it cut, and it shows. It’s almost hitting her butt. It’s dry and brittle and just running her fingers along an inch of it, she can feel innumerable split ends. It’s clean today, she showered after she went to the gym with Akande, but when he’s gone it’ll get lank and greasy. Every day she puts off combing it, because it’s a painful and boring process.

 

She could go to a salon. She would go to very nice ones before. But she doesn’t want to deal with random people staring at her and talking to her and touching her. She doesn’t want to watch them try to hide their judgment at how she’s let herself go like this.

 

So she takes the scissor to her hair herself. It doesn’t bite right through, she has to saw at it a bit. But soon, her hair is at her chin, and there’s a couple feet of navy in her hand.

 

In the makeover shows Widow used to watch with her mother, women would always cup their hands over their mouths and tear up when they saw that long part of themselves severed. Widow knows who she is. She isn’t sure what she was expecting. But she doesn’t really feel anything different. The itch is still present, and she can’t tell if cutting all that hair off has alleviated it in the slightest. She cuts another inch off by her right cheek. She still can’t quite tell, but there’s definitely something satisfying about the snipping sensation and the immediate change in her appearance. It reminds her of a landed shot.

 

When the scissor hit her right cheek, she sets them down on the bathroom counter. Her hair still isn’t even. The left side is noticeably higher than the right. Widow can only imagine what the back of her head looks like right now.

 

But it isn’t even that it looks so bad, it’s that it looks so different. Widow doesn’t care what people say about her. But she doesn’t like that they talk about her. This is going to draw too much attention to her. She just wants to be left alone.

 

Widow runs a hand over her face. She’s still tired. And cutting off her hair might not have accomplished whatever she wanted it to but this time when she gets into bed, she falls asleep.

 

-

 

She goes to sleep later than she usually does, but she wakes up a little later than normal. And when she does, Sombra’s fast asleep next to her. Widow pushes herself up and smiles fondly down at her. Sombra likes to sleep in, and she must have gotten home late from her mission. Widow won’t wake her.

 

Sombra’s hair is fanned out over her pillow, the dip-dyed ends just off Widow’s hand. Sombra must have seen her, Widow realizes with a jolt. Sombra must have seen what she did to her hair. She’s afraid, for a minute. Then she realizes that Sombra stayed here, and Sombra fell asleep.

 

Some of Sombra’s hair has fallen over her face, and Widow gently brushes it away. Sombra wiggles a little and smiles in her sleep. Widow sets up the espresso machine for when Sombra wakes up, grabs a can of cold brew for herself out of the fridge, and sits in the living room watching Akande’s reality show and waiting.

 

In a couple hours, Widow hears movement from behind her. She twists around in her armchair. Sombra’s stumbling out of the bedroom, rubbing her eyes and yawning. “‘Morning.”

 

“Good morning,” Widow says.

 

Sombra shambles past her and peers in the espresso machine. “You’re an angel.”

 

“Eat something too,” Widow says. Sombra gives her a thumbs up and plops down on the sofa with her tiny espresso and a big bag of chips.

 

“So,” Sombra says. Widow sighs and closes her laptop. “What happened with the hair?”

 

“It was getting too long.”

 

“It had been that long for a while,” Sombra says. “I was gone for like– a week, right? I don’t know when you cut it, but why now?”

 

“It wasn’t because you left,” Widow says automatically.

 

“I know.”

 

Widow nods, and fidgets with the cord of her laptop. “Akande said I should do it.”

 

“Did Akande do this?” Sombra asks. She looks some combination of dubious and indignant, and Widow has to work to not laugh.

 

“No. I did.”

 

“Why?”

 

Sombra’s her girlfriend, she trusts Sombra, as much as anyone can trust Sombra, as much as she can trust anyone. But Sombra’s good with people. Sombra relishes every minute of human contact, and always makes the most out of it. And Sombra might needle Reyes about his obsessive planning, but she’s not impulsive. Not even close. Widow folds her hands in her lap. She doesn’t think Sombra will laugh at her. But she doesn’t think she’ll understand, either.

 

Sombra sighs. “What do you want to do about it?”

 

“I don’t know,” Widow says. She stares down at her lap, very aware that Sombra’s watching her.

 

“Do you want to leave it like this?”

 

“No.”

 

“What do you want it to look like instead?”

 

“I don’t know!”

 

Sombra blinks and sets down her cup. Widow’s suddenly horribly aware of her body. Her breathing is heavy, her slow heart rate is picking up, her throat feels tight. It reminds her of how she felt last night, but she’s not tired anymore. She could run, if she really wanted to. She leans forward on her knees, cupping her hands around her mouth.

 

“Hey,” Sombra says softly. “Hey. It’s okay. We’ll figure this out. It’s not so bad.”

 

“It’s atrocious.”

 

“It’s a little janky right now,” Sombra admits. She runs her fingers quickly and lightly through Widow’s hair, just straightening it out. It still makes Widow shiver. “But I’ve cut hair before. I can fix this, if you want.”

 

Widow laughs weakly. “Well. You might not be fixing me, but it’s a start.”

 

“I don’t want to fix you,” Sombra says. The tip of her tongue pokes out of her mouth as she tussles Widow’s hair. “I just don’t want you running around looking like the dolls I had when I was a kid. Though the haircuts I gave them were still better than this.”

 

“Your skills must have improved,” Widow says, as she follows Sombra to the bathroom. “Arturito’s hair looks fine.”

 

Sombra picks up the scissors. “You shouldn’t tease the woman cutting your hair.”

 

Widow pulled a sour face but, since Sombra was right, she didn’t respond. “How did you learn how to cut hair?” she asks instead.

 

Sombra doesn’t answer right away. She cuts the first line of hair– maybe a centimeter, along Widow’s left side. Then she steps back to examine her work, combs out the next section of hair with her fingers, and answers. “There was a girl in Los Muertos who cut everyone’s hair for free. I found out she cut her own hair, too, and I got her to teach me how she did it.”

 

“If she cut everyone’s hair for free, why did you want to do it yourself?”

 

“It was Los Muertos. People went away all the time. It seemed stupid to rely on someone else, if I could do it myself.”

 

Sombra drops those pieces of her past more frequently than she used to. She’s always said them matter-of-factly, but now her casualness doesn’t feel as much like some kind of test for Widow. Maybe because by now, Widow knows she’ll always fail. She always feels like an idiot, that Sombra knew things as a child that she’s only just learning now, and she always feels bad for Sombra.

 

Sombra doesn’t want her to feel bad for her. Widow learned that much. So Widow just nods and changes the subject again. “What are you going to do with my hair?” she asks.

 

“I’m cutting my initials into the back of your head.”

 

“No you’re not. That’d be a security breach.”

 

Sombra snorts. “You should make the woman cutting your hair laugh either,” she chides. “Anyway. I’m just tidying it up right now. What kind of style do you want?”

 

“Ugh.” Widow raised her hand to her head, only for Sombra to gently smack it down. “You should just shave it all off.”

 

“We’ve discussed this. If you were bald, you’d look like Megamind.”

 

“I never should have told you that,” Widow grumbles, but she has to smile when Sombra laughs. “Something short and simple, then, I suppose. I don’t want to have to deal with it any more than I have to.”

 

“Alright.” Sombra combs her fingers through Widow’s hair again and looks her over. “I can do that. I’m going to use my razor, though. Some kind of buzzcut type thing, with it longer on top– I think that would look really good on you.”

 

“Not Megamind-esque?”

 

“Not like any Dreamworks character,” Sombra says, as she’s rooting through the top drawer. Widow watches her silently as she shears off the sides of her head. The hair that’s left is thicker than it is on the shaved side of Sombra’s head. But it’s still shorter than Widow’s ever had it before.

 

“I’m sorry,” Widow says. Sombra frowns.

 

“Don’t be. This isn’t a big deal. I do this for myself every month. And you’re going to look cute.”

 

“No, but–” Widow reaches to rub her face again, but catches herself in time. “This is– I shouldn’t have done this. I’m sorry you have to deal with it.”

 

Sombra sets down the razor. “It’s just hair,” she says. “I’ve seen worse. Is it a big deal for you?”

 

Widow meets Sombra’s eyes in the mirror. “No.”

 

“Then it’s not a big deal to me,” Sombra says. She picks up the scissors and starts working on the top of Widow’s head. “I meant what I said. I didn’t start dating you because you could be someone else, if I pushed you. I knew who you were. And I liked her.”

 

Widow smiles and watches her hair fall.

 

-

 

The next morning, Widow wakes up early. She leaves Sombra in their bed to get ready. She doesn’t have to comb her hair to put it in a ponytail. It’s simple, and it’s nice.

 

Akande does a double take when she comes into the gym. “You cut your hair,” he says.

 

“I still have more than you,” she says, as she slips under the ropes of the ring. He smiles.

 

“It looks good, Lacroix.”

 

“Thank you,” she says. Then she readies her stance. She’s been looking forward to this. Her restlessness is gone.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Dedicated to [@bloomingjellies](https://twitter.com/bloomingjellies) & her amazing "Widow's long-ass depression hair" hc.
> 
> I'm [@tacticalgrandma](https://twitter.com/tacticalgrandma) on twitter if you want to talk to me there!
> 
> Thank you so much for reading, and any comments/kudos would mean the world <3


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